A Sonnet of Sorts #NaPoWriMo

Write a sonnet, they said.  I’m on it, I said.
Except today it seems I have nothing to say,
nothing of substance anyway.  I’ve been travelling.
again from city to city, sometimes this is how 
my writing gets done.  But now it’s too hard
to concentrate because the walls are paper thin 
and the couple next door are making love again 
and they’ve been at it quite a while now.  Still, 
I think it’s sweet that they’re trying to be quiet 
because they know the walls cannot disguise
every knocking groan and sigh, and I can surely
hear them but in truth, it doesn’t bother me
except for the fact I have to write a sonnet
when I really haven’t anything to say.

_{^{© N Nazir 2024}}

NaPoWriMo Prompt 27: to write an “American sonnet.” What’s that? Well, it’s like a regular sonnet but . . . fewer rules? Like a traditional Spencerian or Shakespearean sonnet, an American sonnet is shortish (generally 14 lines, but not necessarily!), discursive, and tends to end with a bang, but there’s no need to have a rhyme scheme or even a specific meter. Here are a few examples:

• Wanda Coleman’s American Sonnet (10)
• Terence Hayes’s American Sonnet for the New Year
• Ted Berrigan’s Sonnet LXXXVIII

If you’d like more specific instructions for how to get started, Write 253 has a great “formula” prompt for an American sonnet, which you can find here.

*you could definitely say my sonnet ended with a bang.